Blower apparatus for air-supported structures

ABSTRACT

A blower apparatus has a substantially closed housing formed as a trailer and an air passage through this housing. A blower in the passage sucks air in through one of two filters, i.e., a normal dust filter or an ABC (atomic, biological, chemical) filter, and expels it into the chamber formed between two walls of a double-walled air-supported structure. Some of the pressurized air is leaked into the housing to maintain this at superatmospheric pressure so that contaminants cannot enter. A heat exchanger is provided in the air stream for air which is used to pressurize the area enclosed by the structure, and a shunt from this exchanger back to the passage upstream of the blower is controlled by a thermostatic valve. The pressure in the chamber is greater than that in the area.

D United States atent [151 3,666,174 Brylka et al. [4 May 30, 1972 BLOWER APPARATUS FOR AIR- [56] References Cited SUPPORTED STRUCTURES UNITED STATES PATENTS [72] Inventors: Rudolf Brylka, Essen; Hans-Jurgen Klein- 2,336,115 1945 H "1 /110 B wachter, Bad Nenndorf, both of Germany 2,898,836 8/1959 Lockheed ..98/1 .5

3,261,659 71966 S h ht ta1......l26 ll 73 Assignees: Kappers Klimatechnik GmbH & Co. KG,' c enberge O UX Bad Nenndorf; Fried Krupp Gesenschafl Primary Examiner-Charles J. Myhre mlt beschrankter Haftung, Essen, Ger- A"0mey Kafl E Ross many; part interest to each 221 Filed: Nov. 14, 1969 [571 ABSTRACT [2]] App] No; 876,857 A blower apparatus has a substantially closed housing formed as a trailer and an air passage through this housing. A blower in the passage sucks air in through one of two filters. i.e.. a [30] Foreign Application Priority Data normal dust filter or an ABC (atomic, biological, chemical) filter, and expels it into the chamber formed between two Dec. 6, 1968 Germany ..P l8 13 089.7 walls ofa doub1e waed pp structure. some of the pressurized air is leaked into the housing to maintain this at su- [52] US. Cl. ..237/2 R, peratmospheric pressure so hat contaminants cannot enten A 51 I t Cl F24h 3 02 heat exchanger is provided in the air stream for air which is E used to pressurize the area enclosed by the structure, and a 165/122; 98/l.5, DIG. 2; 52/2 shunt from this exchanger back to the passage upstream of the blower is controlled by a thermostatic valve. The pressure in the chamber is greater than that in the area.

10 Claims, 4 Drawing Figures PATENTED MAY 3 0 m2 SHEET 10F 4 Rudolf Bry/ka Hans-Jijrgen Klemw'chf'er In ventor.

By a I 61 s Attorney PATENTEOmso m2 3.666, 1 74 SHEET 30F a Rudolf Brg/ka Hans-Jijrgen Kleinw'chfer In venlor.

By (R08 Attorney PATENTEDHAY 30 I972 SHEET a UF 4 Rudolf Brg/ka 2 Hans-Jijrgen K/einwa'chfer Inventor.

Attorney BLOWER APPARATUS FOR AIR-SUPPORTED STRUCTURES The present invention relates to an apparatus for supplying air under pressure to a double-walled or inflatable structure and, more particularly, to a portable apparatus of this type.

Air-supported structures and buildings have the advantage of being extremely easy to set up. For this reason they are extremely useful in emergency situations where the existing structures and buildings have been somehow rendered unusable. Such is particularly the case in emergency or ABC (atomic, biological, chemical) situations where such problems as radiation and poisonous substances in the air must be dealt with.

Conventional apparatus for supplying fluid under pressure for inflating or stiffening such structures often simply consists of a large blower which sucks in air through some sort of dust filter and delivers it through a conduit to the structure. A housing may be provided, in some cases, to protect the blower and many air conduits often necessary, especially when the air is to be heated. Such an arrangement is, however, far from ideal. Dirt and other contaminants invariably manage to get into the air passage downstream of the filter, so that the air fed into the area enclosed by the structure of the chamber between the structures walls is contaminated. Even when a housing is provided, there may be leakage, especially in emergency conditions when the device must be transported, so that the output air is contaminated.

The seriousness of all these drawbacks increases all the more under emergency conditions when, for example, radioactive dust or bacteria must be completely removed from the air to make it safe for humans to breathe or live in. What is more, the normal-use filters of the above-described type of apparatus rarely are capable of removing a sufficient quantity of impurities from the air, whereas changing over to other, more efficient filters is a troublesome task in emergency conditions.

It is, therefore, the general object of the present invention to provide an improved apparatus of the above-mentioned type.

A more specific object is to provide such an apparatus which overcomes the above-mentioned disadvantages: i.e., which allows virtually no contaminants to get into the air passage downstream of the filter while being readily adaptable for functioning in ABC catastrophes.

The above objects are attained, in accordance with the present invention, with an apparatus for supplying air under pressure to a double-walled structure wherein the blower is mounted in a passage extending through a substantially closed housing. This passage, which is formed by a plurality of conduits, chambers and so on, is open downstream of the blower to the interior of the closed housing so that the housing also is pressurized. In this manner, even if the housing is damaged and springs a leak, contaminants will not be able to blow in, since there will always be a pressure differential blowing outwardly.

According to a further feature of the invention, a pair of filters is provided, in separate branches, in the passage upstream of the blower, each filter with its own inlet port opening externally of the housing. One of these filters is a standard dust filter while the other (although preferably a pair are used in parallel) is an emergency-use ABC filter. This latter ofiers greater resistance to air flow than the normal dust filter.

In accordance with a particularly advantageous feature of the present invention, valve means is provided downstream of the dust filter so that, due to lesser air-flow resistance, in an open condition of this valve practically all air flow goes through the dust filter while with the valve closed all goes through the ABC filters. In this manner, the ABC filters are effectively cut out of use in normal operating conditions, but may be quickly brought into play when desired.

In accordance with yet a further feature of the present invention, there is a chamber downstream of the blower which opens through small ports into the interior of the housing, through a conduit directly into the chamber between the walls of the structure, and opens into a further chamber housing a heat exchanger. The air passed through and over this heat exchanger is used to heat the space enclosed by the structure. A thermostatically controlled feedback valve in a conduit connected from the heat exchanger chamber back to a point in the passage upstream of the blower serves to control the amount of heating.

The above and other objects, features, and advantages will become apparent from the following drawing, reference being made to the accompanying drawing, in which:

FIG. 1 is a perspective view, partly broken away, showing an apparatus according to the present invention;

FIG. 2 is a horizontal sectional plan view of the apparatus;

FIG. 3 is a vertical section through the apparatus according to the arrow III of FIG. 2; and

FIG. 4 is a schematic of the fluid-flow path of the apparatus shown in FIGS. 1 -3.

As shown in FIG. 4, an apparatus 1 for supplying air under pressure to an air-supported structure 25 having a pair of walls 26 and 27 defining between each other a chamber 28 with the whole structure 25 enclosing a space 29.

The apparatus 1, as also shown in FIGS. 1 3, has a rectangular-parallelopipedal substantially closed housing 5 formed as a single-axle trailer adapted to ride on a pair of wheels 30 pulled behind an automotive vehicle via a hitch 31.

An air inlet 6 is formed in the front and wall of the housing 5, with a dust filter 2 directly behind it. This filter is connected to a box 32 forming a chamber connected through a pair of valves 8 to another chamber compartment 10 on which a blower 9 driven by a motor 19 is mounted. The valves 8 each have a control wheel 33 which is accessible through one of several doors 21 in the sidewalls of the housing.

The ABC filters 2 have inlets 7 on the topwall of the housing 5 and are each connected at their bases through an outlet conduit 18 to the chamber 18 mounting the blower 9, which is of the axial-input radial-output type. The blower output is connected through a duct 12 to a distributing compartment 11 formed with four small ports 16 which leak air under pressure into the housing 5 so that this latter is under a superatmospheric pressure.

A duct 13 leads directly from the distributing compartment 11 to an outlet 14 on the back of the housing 5 and thence a conduit 35 leads to the chamber 28 between the walls of the structure 25.

Below the compartment 11 is a heat exchanger 4 which rests on the housing bottom wall and which is heated by an oil burner 17 having its own air intake 36 and exhaust chimney 37. After being heated in the heat exchanger 4, the air can either pass out of the housing 5 through an outlet 15 and into the interior 29 of the structure 25, or can be shunted back via a conduit 23 to the chamber 10.

A valve 22 in the conduit 23 is coupled to a thermostat 34 to control the amount of heat imparted to the air and has a manual control handle 38 protruding from the side of the housing 5. This thermostat 34 is preferably responsive to the temperature in the area 29, although it can also be responsive to the ambient temperature. Controls 39 are mounted in a switch box 20 on the side of the housing 5.

The air pumped into the area 29 is at lower pressure than that pumped into the chamber 28 since the heat exchanger 4 offers increased resistance to the former, and the shunt 23 also drops the pressure somewhat.

Under normal nonemergency conditions, the valves 8 are wide open so that dust alone is filtered out of the air. Virtually no air is sucked in through the filters 3 since these ofier a relatively great resistance to air flow. In case of an ABC emergency, the valves 8 are closed so that air must be drawn in only through the highly efficient ABC filters 3.

Should the housing 5 be damaged, or spring a leak in some manner, the superatmospheric pressure in its interior will prevent any contaminants from entering, even if the air passage formed by the conduits I2, 13, 18 and the chambers 10, 1 1, 4, and 32 should also have leaks.

We claim:

1. An apparatus for supplying air under pressure to an airsupported structure formed with an air-support chamber, said apparatus comprising:

a substantially air-tight housing;

means forming an air passage through said housing, said passage having an air-inlet end communicating with the atmosphere around said housing and an air-outlet end connectable to said structure;

blower means along said passage for drawing air in through said inlet end and supplying air under pressure to said outlet end; and

means communicating between the interior of said housing and said passage and disposed between said blower means and said outlet end for maintaining the interior of said housing at a pressure above that of the surrounding atmosphere.

2. The apparatus defined in claim 1, further comprising an air filter in said passage between said blower means and said inlet end.

3. The apparatus defined in claim 2 wherein said structure encloses a space, is double walled, and forms between its walls said air-support chamber, said apparatus further comprising means connecting said passage to said space for pressurizing same to a pressure less than that to which said chamber is pressurized.

4. The apparatus defined in claim 3, further comprising heater means in said means connecting said passage to said space for heating air passing therethrough,

5. The apparatus defined in claim 4, further comprising shunt means extending from said heater means to said passage between said blower means and said filter, and valve means in said shunt means for restricting the flow cross section thereof.

6. The apparatus defined inclaim 5 wherein said valve means includes a thermostat responsive to temperature in said space, said thermostat being operatively connected to said valve means.

7. The apparatus defined in claim 2 wherein said air filter is primarily a dust filter, said apparatus further comprising at least one ABC filter in said passage upstream of said blower means, and valve means for restricting air flow through one of said filters.

8. The apparatus defined in claim 7 wherein said ABC filter offers more internal resistance to air flow than said dust filter, said valve means including at least one valve between said dust filter and said blower means, said filters being connected in parallel, said inlet end of said passage being an inlet for said ABC filter and a separate inlet for said dust filter.

9. The apparatus defined in claim 1 wherein said housing is transportable and is formed as a trailer adapted to be drawn behind an automotive vehicle.

10. The apparatus defined in claim 9 wherein said housing is rectangular and has top, bottom, side, and end walls, said apparatus further comprising:

a dust filter mounted on one end wall of said housing at said inlet end of said passage;

a collecting chamber in said passage downstream of said dust filter;

a pair of valves in said passage downstream of said collecting chamber;

a compartment in said passage between said valves and said blower means;

a pair of upright cylindrical ABC filters standing on said bottom wall and each having an air inlet extending from its upper portion through said top wall and an air outlet extending from its lower portion to said compartment chamber, said passage being thereby branched upstream of said compartment;

a dispersing chamber in said passage downstream of said blower means, said dispersing chamber being formed with at least one port constituting said means communicating between the interior of said housing and said passage;

a conduit extending from said dispersing chamber through the other of said end walls and forming a connection for coupling with said air-sup ort chamber;

a heater in said passage ownstream of said dispersing chamber, said passage being thereby branched downstream of said displacing chamber;

a shunt extending between said passage at said heater and said compartment for airflow therebetween; and

thermostatically-controlled valve means in said shunt for closing same. 

1. An apparatus for supplying air under pressure to an airsupported structure formed with an air-support chamber, said apparatus comprising: a substantially air-tight housing; means forming an air passage through said housing, said passage having an air-inlet end communicating with the atmosphere around said housing and an air-outlet end connectable to said structure; blower means along said passage for drawing air in through said inlet end and supplying air under pressure to said outlet end; and means communicating between the interior of said housing and said passage and disposed between said blower means and said outlet end for maintaining the interior of said housing at a pressure above that of the surrounding atmosphere.
 2. The apparatus defined in claim 1, further comprising an air filter in said passage between said blower means and said inlet end.
 3. The apparatus defined in claim 2 wherein said structure encloses a space, is double walled, and forms between its walls said air-support chamber, said apparatus further comprising means connecting said passage to said space for pressurizing same to a pressure less than that to which said chamber is pressurized.
 4. The apparatus defined in claim 3, further comprising heater means in said means connecting said passage to said space for heating air passing therethrough.
 5. The apparatus defined in claim 4, further comprising shunt means extending from said heater means to said passage between said blower means and said filter, and valve means in said shunt means for restricting the flow cross section thereof.
 6. The apparatus defined inclaim 5 wherein said valve means includes a thermostat responsive to temperature in said space, said thermostat being operatively connected to said valve means.
 7. The apparatus defined in claim 2 wherein said air filter is primarily a dust filter, said apparatus further comprising at least one ABC filter in said passage upstream of said blower means, and valve means for restricting air flow through one of said filters.
 8. The apparatus defined in claim 7 wherein said ABC filter offers more internal resistance to air flow than said dust filter, said valve means including at leaSt one valve between said dust filter and said blower means, said filters being connected in parallel, said inlet end of said passage being an inlet for said ABC filter and a separate inlet for said dust filter.
 9. The apparatus defined in claim 1 wherein said housing is transportable and is formed as a trailer adapted to be drawn behind an automotive vehicle.
 10. The apparatus defined in claim 9 wherein said housing is rectangular and has top, bottom, side, and end walls, said apparatus further comprising: a dust filter mounted on one end wall of said housing at said inlet end of said passage; a collecting chamber in said passage downstream of said dust filter; a pair of valves in said passage downstream of said collecting chamber; a compartment in said passage between said valves and said blower means; a pair of upright cylindrical ABC filters standing on said bottom wall and each having an air inlet extending from its upper portion through said top wall and an air outlet extending from its lower portion to said compartment chamber, said passage being thereby branched upstream of said compartment; a dispersing chamber in said passage downstream of said blower means, said dispersing chamber being formed with at least one port constituting said means communicating between the interior of said housing and said passage; a conduit extending from said dispersing chamber through the other of said end walls and forming a connection for coupling with said air-support chamber; a heater in said passage downstream of said dispersing chamber, said passage being thereby branched downstream of said displacing chamber; a shunt extending between said passage at said heater and said compartment for airflow therebetween; and thermostatically-controlled valve means in said shunt for closing same. 